Tag Archives: Pope St. John Paul II

The Body Reveals What We Are Made For

For many of us during these warm months, our thoughts turn to swimming pools, the beach or just plain working on our tan. In the summer, we tend to be more aware of — and more conscious of — our bodies.

It is true that all of us are aware of our bodies and concerned about how we look and present ourselves to others, and how others look and present themselves to us. This should not surprise us. Our bodies are the “place” where we first meet and encounter each other. It is our body that first reveals something about us to others. It reveals our age and gender. A bright smile or wrinkled frown immediately communicates to others something of what is in our heart at that moment. Our bodies make visible a glimmer of the invisible reality of our heart and spirit.

The Bible’s second story of creation (Genesis 2:4-25), filled with symbolism, proclaims that our bodies reveal to us the deepest meaning of our human lives. The story suggests that when the first man, Adam, was created, he examined his body. He had eyes to see, ears to hear, a mouth to speak, hands to touch and a heart that desired to share his life with someone else. Yet, he found himself alone.

Then God created the first woman—Eve. We can imagine that, at first, she had the same experience. She realized that the very purpose for which she was made— relationships—could not be accomplished alone. When Adam and Eve then met each other, Adam exclaimed: “This one at last is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh!” Adam and Eve realized that finally there was someone with whom they could enter into relationship—another person with whom they could share their lives.

Our bodies reveal to us the meaning of life. We were created for relationships. We were made to love. It is only in the experience of relationships that we find the deepest peace and joy that our hearts desire. From the most casual friendships between neighbors and coworkers, to the depths of intimacy shared between spouses, to the ultimate relationship that we share with God —our relationships are the most valuable possessions we can possibly acquire in life.

The meaning of life is love. We don’t have to probe the mysteries of the universe to discover this—we have only to look in the mirror. Our bodies reveal to us the purpose of our existence. Our minds, hearts and bodies were designed by God to draw us into the many forms of relationships that we experience in life. This is what St. John Paul II called the “Theology of the Body.” In a beautifully mysterious way, the human body reveals to us who we are, what God created us to do and what will bring us lasting happiness.

So, as we head to the beach, as we shake hands with our buddies after the ball game, when we hug our child or embrace our spouse, or when we see a warm, friendly smile on a stranger’s face—our bodies remind us that we are made for genuine love.

For a fuller treatment of the topic in this column, please visit www.ErieRCD.org/singer.htm to hear Father Chris’ first Theology of the Body series talk.

About the author
Fr. Chris Singer is chancellor of the Diocese of Erie and presented a lecture series on the Theology of the Body in the Fall of 2014. Reprinted with permission from FAITH magazine in the Diocese of Erie (Last Word column).

Why Did the Risen Jesus Cook Breakfast for the Disciples?

I love food. My parents tell me that, as a little child, I was a mostly calm, happy-go-lucky kid—unless I was hungry. Then I turned into a monster. But once I found something to eat—serenity returned. Some of my family members say that little has changed with me in the many intervening years! I grew up working in my family’s food business. Stories about food get my attention.

Thus I’m a fan of the resurrection stories. They often involve food. In Luke, the risen Jesus walks unrecognized with two of his disciples. It was only after they arrived at the village of Emmaus, and Jesus broke the bread at the dinner table, that they finally recognized him. The story continues with Jesus appearing to a group of disciples and asking them, “Do you have anything to eat here?” They gave him a piece of baked fish. (Luke 24:13-48) Then there is the scene with Peter and other disciples after a long day of fishing. They see the risen Lord calling them from the shore. When they arrive, they find that he has cooked a breakfast of bread and fish for them and invites them to “Come, have breakfast.” (John 21:1-14) I’ll bet there were some eggs and pancakes on the side too!

All this talk about food makes me hungry. But it also makes me wonder why Jesus put such emphasis on eating. Maybe he was just hungry. Jesus did some other curious things right after the resurrection: like breathing on his disciples and inviting Thomas to actually touch his nail wounds and feel the sword gash in his side. Jesus seems to be going out of his way to assure his friends that it was really he who was present; not a ghost or vision. It was he, fully alive and in the flesh.

“‘The flesh is the hinge of salvation.’ We believe in God who is creator of the flesh; we believe in the Word made flesh in order to redeem the flesh; we believe in the resurrection of the flesh, the fulfilment of both the creation and the redemption of the flesh.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church n. 1015.)

These resurrection scenes drive home to us the importance of the flesh, that is, the human body. For Jesus, his physical body wasn’t just something that he “wore” while on earth, but part of his very being. And for us, our bodies are not something solely for this life which we forever discard at the time of death. As human beings, we are a beautifully mysterious combination of body and spirit. Just as in the Ascension, Jesus took his resurrected body with him back to the Father, we, too, at the end of time, will receive back our glorified body for entrance into heaven. The body is a profoundly good part of how God created us. The body is holy—thus what we do with our bodies really matters.

The newly canonized Saint John Paul II spent many years of his life reflecting on the meaning of the body. Drawing from the Bible and theology, he composed a work called the Theology of the Body. He explains that it is through the body, and the experiences of the body, that we most completely come to know ourselves and God. St. John Paul II makes this bold assertion:

“The body, in fact, and it alone, is capable of making visible what is invisible: the spiritual and divine.” (Feb. 20, 1980)

Over these next few months, I invite you to join me in exploring how our bodies help us to better understand ourselves, and the God who made us.

In May, spring takes hold and our senses are heightened. Our senses, working through our body, allow us to feel a warm breeze, enjoy a sunset, listen to music, share a handshake and give a hug. They also allow us to enjoy a burger off the backyard grill. And that makes someone like me quite happy about the Theology of the Body!

Learning Love: The Theology of the Body and the Family (Part 2)

Learning Love: Theology of the Body and the Family (Part 1)

Saint John Paul II’s catechesis on the human person and love, commonly known as the Theology of the Body, has developed an ever-growing following and continues to captivate the attention of young and old, religious and lay, married and single persons throughout the world. There are many different ways to learn about this teaching: through programs, courses, personal study, and group reflection. However, there is one place that serves as an excellent classroom for the Theology of the Body: the family.

The family is the domestic Church. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states, “The home is the first school of the Christian life where all learn love, repeated forgiveness, and prayerful worship” (no. 1666). It is in the context of our families that we first learn love. One way in which families can accomplish this formation in love is to take steps to live out the Theology of the Body in the home.

This might seem like a daunting task, but teaching your family about the Theology of the Body does not necessarily mean sitting them down and explaining the eschaton (the “end times”) or talking about sex, although that is part of it. Teaching your family the Theology of the Body is no more or less than teaching them that they are loved and called to love.

As a fundamental anthropology of the human person, John Paul II’s Theology of the Body is not meant only for those who are married but for all members of the human race, no matter their age, relationship status or vocation. Theologically, there are many complex aspects of this teaching, but we do not all have to be theologians or scholars to understand the core principles or to live them out in our homes and our lives. Here are a few examples of how the Theology of the Body can be lived out in the home.

The Goodness and Beauty of the Body

“God created man in his image; in the image of God he created him.” (Gen 1:27)

Recognizing the goodness and beauty of the body is the first step to living out the Theology of the Body. In the first part of his catechesis on the Theology of the Body, St. John Paul II reflects on the creation accounts found in Genesis, and he reflects on the fact that man was created by God in His image and likeness and was deemed “good” by God (Gen 1:31). As a creation of God, the body is good and should be cared for and respected by ourselves and others.

The Incarnation further dignifies the human body since through His Incarnation, Christ entered the world with a body that is like our own bodies. As the Second Vatican Council said in a section often quoted by John Paul II, “Only in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light.…Christ, the final Adam…fully reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear” (Gaudium et Spes, no. 22).

Affirming the body’s beauty and dignity does not necessarily mean telling someone that they look “beautiful” in terms of worldly standards, but rather assuring them that they are beautiful as a unique creation of God. As family members’ bodies change over time, it is especially important to emphasize the goodness of the body and the ways in which it reflects Christ in a very real way. This teaches them that as their bodies – and the bodies of others – change for better or for worse, they are not losing any of their worth.

Affirming the goodness of the body also means proclaiming the goodness of your own body. It is often easier to see the goodness and beauty of others, but when it comes time to recognize it in ourselves, suddenly we are left with nothing good to say. As a good and beautiful creation of God, each one of us is called to accept our bodies, as a man or as a woman, and to care for them.

The Language of the Body

“The body is…the means of the expression of man as an integral whole, of the person, which reveals itself through ‘the language of the body.’” (TOB 123:2)

Very often, we are unconscious of the messages that we are sending with our bodies, yet they are powerful tools of communication. As St. John Paul II said, “Through sexual union the body speaks a ‘language’…this language must be spoken in truth” (TOB 106.3). But this language is not solely spoken through the sexual union. Our bodies can communicate how we feel about ourselves, those we are with, the situation we are in, our mood and countless other messages.

We must become conscious of this language and use it in a way that communicates the love of God and recognizes the beauty and dignity of each human person. Try to recognize the messages that your family members are sending to you through their body language, and the messages that you are sending to them. Having a discussion about this can bring your family to an awareness of the language of the body.

Simple things such as looking up from your phone during a conversation, making eye contact, and dressing both modestly and appropriately for the occasion, all communicate that you recognize the dignity of the person(s) before you and recognize that they too are made in the image and likeness of God and are worthy of love and service.

Emily Stimpson’s book These Beautiful Bones: An Everyday Theology of the Body beautifully elaborates on how manners, dress codes, and body language can be simple ways of living out the Theology of the Body in our everyday lives.

Next: Part Two.

Why Natural Family Planning Differs from Contraception

In 1998 Pope John Paul II wrote a letter to Dr. Anna Cappella, director of the Center for Research and Study on the Natural Regulation of Fertility at Rome’s Catholic University of the Sacred Heart. The occasion was a convention commemorating Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical. Excerpts are reprinted below.

I hope that everyone will benefit from a closer study of the Church’s teaching on the truth of the act of love in which spouses become sharers in God’s creative action.

The truth of this act stems from its being an expression of the spouses’ reciprocal personal giving, a giving that can only be total since the person is one and indivisible. In the act that expresses their love, spouses are called to make a reciprocal gift of themselves to each other in the totality of their person: nothing that is part of their being can be excluded from this gift. This is the reason for the intrinsic unlawfulness of contraception: it introduces a substantial limitation into this reciprocal giving, breaking that “inseparable connection” between the two meanings of the conjugal act, the unitive and the procreative, which, as Pope Paul VI pointed out, are written by God himself into the nature of the human being (HV, no. 12).

Continuing in this vein, the great pontiff rightly emphasized the “essential difference” between contraception and the use of natural methods in exercising “responsible procreation.” It is an anthropological difference because in the final analysis it involves two irreconcilable concepts of the person and of human sexuality (cf. Familiaris Consortio, no. 32).

It is not uncommon in current thinking for the natural methods of fertility regulation to be separated from their proper ethical dimension and to be considered in their merely functional aspect. It is not surprising then that people no longer perceive the profound difference between these and the artificial methods. As a result, they go so far as to speak of them as if they were another form of contraception. But this is certainly not the way they should be viewed or applied.

On the contrary, it is only in the logic of the reciprocal gift between man and woman that the natural regulation of fertility can be correctly understood and authentically lived as the proper expression of a real and mutual communion of love and life. It is worth repeating here that “the person can never be considered as a means to an end, above all never a means of ‘pleasure.’ The person is and must be nothing other than the end of every act. Only then does the action correspond to the true dignity of the person.” (cf. Letter to Families, no. 12).

The Church is aware of the various difficulties married couples can encounter, especially in the present social context, not only in following but also in the very understanding of the moral norm that concerns them. Like a mother, the Church draws close to couples in difficulty to help them; but she does so by reminding them that the way to finding a solution to their problems must come through full respect for the truth of their love. “It is an outstanding manifestation of charity toward souls to omit nothing from the saving doctrine of Christ,” Paul VI admonished (HV, no. 29).

The Church makes available to spouses the means of grace which Christ offers in redemption and invites them to have recourse to them with ever renewed confidence. She exhorts them in particular to pray for the gift of the Holy Spirit, which is poured out in their hearts through the efficacy of their distinctive sacrament: this grace is the source of the interior energy they need to fulfill the many duties of their state, starting with that of being consistent with the truth of conjugal love. At the same time, the Church urgently requests the commitment of scientists, doctors, health-care personnel and pastoral workers to make available to married couples all those aids which prove an effective support for helping them fully to live their vocation (cf. HV, no. 23-27).

The Theology of the Body According to St. John Paul II

When John Paul II was elevated to the papacy, he unveiled a series of reflections on which he had worked for some time. He gave these in the form of weekly general audiences between 1979 and 1984. These talks became known as “The Theology of the Body” and have had a growing impact on Christian thinking about what it means to be embodied as male or female.

Reflecting on the Genesis accounts of creation, Pope John Paul II underscored the way in which the body reflects or expresses the person. The human person discovers his dignity through his body and its capacity to express his ability to think and to choose, unlike the animals, who lack this ability. (See Genesis 2:19-21.)

Yet humanity is radically lacking in its expression in only one sex. The full meaning of the body and hence the human person is revealed only when the man stands over against another unique way of being human–woman. This distinctive way of being a person and a gift for others, male and female, reflects what the late pope called “the nuptial meaning of the body.” Coming together in the profound partnership of marriage, man and woman live for the other in mutual love and deference. This union is expressed concretely in the couple’s bodily gift of themselves to one another in sexual intercourse. Here they speak a profound language of total self-gift and unconditional fidelity.

The late pope understood the impact of sin on the human person. The Fall brings about a series of ruptures within the person, radically diminishing the body’s capacity to express reason and freedom. It introduces alienation and a struggle for control into the relationship of male and female, distorting their relationships in marriage and in human society (cf. Genesis 3:16). And it devastates the human sexual drive, redirecting it from an impulse toward life-giving interpersonal union between covenantal partners to a desire to use and exploit others for personal satisfaction.

Yet with the death and resurrection of Christ, sin does not have the last word on the condition of the body. The grace that flows from the cross and resurrection effects a “redemption of the body,” not just in heaven but here and now. Through the healing effects of Christian prayer and sacramental worship, the body is enabled to express the person and his or her ability to think and freely choose.

The grace of Christ also enables men and women to overcome their mutual conflict and live together in marriage in the exercise of “mutual submission out of reverence for Christ” (cf. Ephesians 5:21; Mulieris Dignitatem, no. 24). This transforming grace enables the body in its maleness and femaleness to be offered as the expression of the “sincere gift of self” in a way reflective of the person’s vocation– as single, married, or a consecrated celibate.

The human person as a unique embodied subject is thus understood through the three panels (or triptych) of the Christian mysteries of creation, sin, and redemption. The result is what John Paul II himself modestly referred to as an “adequate” understanding of the person. This vision enables us to recognize and affirm that the body and the gift of sexuality are good. At the same time it highlights why this gift is falsified by extramarital or contraceptive sex that sever sexual union from its inherent meanings of unconditional fidelity and life-giving fruitfulness.

The mystery of the human person is continually confronted by new issues and challenges. For example, much of the reflection on the body and its relation to the person within Christian tradition has been undertaken by men. During his pontificate John Paul II called for a “new feminism” that would better account for the distinctive insights, experiences, and gifts of women.

In addition, issues of the relationship between the body and the person take on new urgency in light of expanding scientific and medical technology that has raised questions at both the beginning of life (reproductive technologies, the status of cryo-preserved embryos, stem cell research, and attempts to clone human beings) and its end (the personhood of the persistently comatose, the meaning of suffering, and how to define the moment of death). To continue to affirm the fundamental biblical conviction of the goodness of the embodied person created in the image of God while addressing such pressing questions is the task for the further refinement of the “adequate anthropology” of John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body.”

About the author
Professor John S. Grabowski is a member of the Department of Theology at The Catholic University of America.

Marital Sexuality

The Catholic Church, in its official teaching, has always taken a positive view of sexuality in marriage. Marital intercourse, says the Catechism of the Catholic Church, is “noble and honorable,” established by God so that “spouses should experience pleasure and enjoyment of body and spirit.” (#2362).

The Church’s positive understanding of sexuality is rooted in the teachings of Jesus that were, in part, drawn from the wisdom of the Old Testament. Both the Book of Genesis and the Song of Songs describe the basic goodness of sexual love in marriage. In the New Testament, Jesus began his public ministry with his supportive presence at the wedding feast of Cana, a further indication of the goodness of marriage.

Marital sexuality achieves two purposes. The Church affirms, first, its role in creating new human life, sometimes called the procreative dimension of sexuality. In giving birth to children and educating them, the couple cooperates with the Creator’s love.

Second, sexual union expresses and deepens the love between husband and wife. This is called the unitive, or relational, aspect of sexuality.

The bond between the procreative and the relational aspects cannot be broken. Each sexual act in a marriage must be open to the possibility of conceiving a child. Contraception is wrong because it separates the act of conception from sexual union. (See Married Love and the Gift of Life for more on this topic.)

Recent church teaching has tried to integrate the two purposes of marriage into a single perspective, which sees marital sexual love as essentially procreative. Marital love is by its nature fruitful; it generates new life. The God-created expression of marital love, joined to an openness to new life, contributes to the holiness of the couple. The “call to holiness in marriage is a lifelong process of conversion and growth.” (Catholic Catechism for Adults, p. 408)

Like all the baptized, married couples are called to chastity. The Church defines chastity as “the successful integration of sexuality within the person.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, #2337). Married couples practice the conjugal chastity that is proper to their state in life.

The late Pope John Paul II wanted to find a new and compelling way to express this positive view of sexuality. He developed a strand of thinking about sexuality and its role in human life called “The Theology of the Body.”

The Pope begins with the idea that each human being is willed for his or her own sake. Out of love God created human beings as male and female, persons of dignity and worthy of respect. Also out of love, God established marriage as the first communion of persons. In marriage, man and woman totally give themselves to each other, and in this self-giving they discover who they are.

The sin of Adam and Eve ruptured this original unity of body and soul. Sadly, we know the results: too often women and men have become objects to be used and exploited. The salvation won for us by Jesus Christ began the process of restoring the lost unity of body and soul. This process is partly completed here; full unity will be restored in the next life.

The Church teaches that human sexuality is sacred. Within marriage, it fulfills its purpose as an expression of deep, faithful and exclusive love that is open to new life. Marital sexual relations involve profound openness and receptivity, a complete and mutual self-giving. Sexuality is an important part of that incredibly rich and mysterious pattern in Creation that comes directly from the mind and heart of God.

The Mountains Bring the Freedom: The Theology of the Body

Karol Wojtyla regularly escaped from the Communist regime into the mountains of Poland. Once there, he and some 200 married couples kayaked, hiked, and talked. They planned no particular diplomatic intervention or militaristic coup. Instead, they discussed the mainstay of resistance to the occupying power. The mountains brought the freedom to converse about the identity of the human person and marriage.

Some thirty years later, Wojtyla, as Pope John Paul II, conversed with a worldwide audience. He gave a series of lectures not in the countryside, but in Rome, almost every Wednesday from 1979 to 1984. The occupying powers this time were secularization, materialism, and the unbridled pursuit of pleasure. His escape route was the same: he taught on the “theology of the body” to describe the identity of the human person and of marriage.

In the theology of the body, Pope John Paul shows no embarrassment for his repeated appeal to the two accounts of creation in Genesis. He admits the accounts are myth, but not in the rationalist sense of fable. They are the classical myth: more than true, they convey a truth too dense to fit in a fact. Instead, the fable is the modern approach to the human person and marriage.

False ideas abound for persons entering marriage today. The contemporary focus on acquisition and consumerism translates into: “The more I get the happier I’ll be.” The concentration on materialism and usefulness translates into “I am what I own.” The emphasis on feeling good translates into “If it feels good do it.” These ideas infect marriage and the sense of the human person. Couples begin to “run their marriages” as a business rather than a bond of love.

The Genesis picture is different. God creates the visible world through a series of commands. The commands cease on the sixth day. God pauses and ponders within himself (Gen 1:26-27). The manner of the human person’s creation is different from that of the rest of the world because the person is different, created in the image and likeness of God. Classical theology teaches that man is the image and likeness of God in the capacity to know and to love.

The second chapter of Genesis presents a mysterious interval between the creation of man and that of woman (Gen 2: 7; Gen 2:22). This interval is the basis for a series of meanings, or original experiences, about the internal identity of the human person and the relation man to woman.

The first original experience is Original Solitude. The popular notion of solitude is a calm, silent retreat at a monastery on a hill. This is not the solitude to which John Paul refers. Original Solitude is the internal, spiritual identity of the human person and the person’s search outside the self to be in relation. Through tilling the soil (Gen 2:5), naming the animals, (Gen 2:19) and the command regarding the tree (Gen 2:17) Adam realizes his identity on the basis of his body: he is a being who has the capacity for consciousness, self-knowledge through self-awareness and self-determination in and through the body.

The body reveals meaning and identity and includes the search outside himself in openness to another in relation. God says, “It is not good for man to be alone, I shall make a helper fit for him” (Gen 2:18). Of course, there is no evil in paradise, so what does “not good” mean here? “Not good” means that man’s identity is not yet complete. The helper is not a helper to till the soil or to name the animals. The helper is the helper in terms of the man’s very identity.

The second original experience, Original Unity, reveals the meaning of the human person created always as either masculine or feminine. The sleep of Adam is no ordinary nap. For Pope John Paul, the sleep precedes a great action of God, as when Abraham fell into a sleep or trance before encountering God, as did Jacob, St. Joseph, and the apostles. The sleep is Adam’s return to the moment preceding his creation. The sleep reveals that Eve is created by God alone. Yet, created from the rib, they share the same humanity.

Upon awakening, Adam speaks for the first time. All the beauty of God’s previous creation has not caused him to speak. But the beauty of woman does. He exclaims, “This, at last, is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called woman, because she has been taken from her man” (Gen 2:23). Adam recognizes her on the basis of her body. And in naming her, he reveals something about himself. Up to now in the Genesis text he has been called the general “Adam” or “person.” Yet when he names her, “woman,” he names himself “man.” Her identity unlocks his, and his identity reveals that of her. The meaning of her identity for his own fills his consciousness, self-awareness, self-knowledge, and self-determination and vice versa.

The third original experience is Original Nakedness. The account further notes that man and woman were naked but not ashamed (Gen 2:25). The nakedness is not merely that Adam and Eve have no clothes. Nakedness is more about what they do have: they share the vision of God when God looked at all he made and said it was very good (Gen 1:31). In the nakedness they see each other with the original vision of God. They understand the meaning of the other and the body of the other in a direct, immediate, simple, full and complete manner.

The body of the other or the self may never be used as an object in a selfish manner. The other is always and only a gift. Love and life always take the form of the gift of self. The meaning of the body for life and love is a spousal meaning. The reciprocity between man and woman is inscribed with the quality of the gift of self. The gift includes from the beginning the blessing of fertility. The communion of persons in marriage in which the two become one so that they may become three – is so profound that John Paul notes the communion of persons as decisive for man as the image of God.

Marriage is the reminder that love can never be reduced to the satisfaction of my own personal need, erotic or otherwise. The spousal meaning of the body is wounded in sin, but not destroyed. Pope John Paul shows that through the human person’s own choice to doubt the gift the person “casts God from his heart” by sin. The fourth original experience, Original Shame, outlines the effects of concupiscence as the flesh wars against the spirit. Through a “fundamental disquiet” and an “interior imbalance,” fear and shame disrupt the relation of marriage. The tendency to reduce and try to dominate or possess the other begins to infiltrate the gift of self. The grace of Christ and the life of virtue both restore the human person’s fruitful response to the spousal meaning of the body.

The theology of the body reasserts the original meaning of the person as a gift fulfilled in an original way through the gift of self in marriage. Through John Paul’s words married couples and those preparing for marriage can find themselves escaping into the mountains away from acquisition to be the gift, away from materialism to spend themselves for the other, away from focus on pleasure to the beauty of the gift of self.

Additional resources:

Pope John Paul II, Crossing the Threshold of Hope (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1994).
Man and Woman He Created Them: A Theology of the Body, translated by Michael Waldstein (Boston: Pauline Books and Media, 2006).

About the author
Msgr. J. Brian Bransfield, STD is the General Secretary of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

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